Brazil elects Bolsonaro in major swing to the right

"If you add up the importance of the state, his very radical discourse and the fact that he is from the military and surrounded by military people, I would say that we have a lot of things to worry about, maybe even more than Americans have to worry about Trump", Zucco Jr. said.

Brazil's right-wing candidate Bolsonaro of the Social Liberal Party won the country's presidential run-off on Sunday, with a 55.13 percent of the valid votes against 44.87 percent for his rival Fernando Haddad of the left-leaning Workers' Party.

The 63-year-old congressman´s rise has been propelled by rejection of the leftist PT that ran Brazil for 13 of the last 15 years and was ousted two years ago in the midst of a deep recession and political graft scandal.

Sebastian Munoz, senior programme officer for Latin America at the War on Want group, said Bolsonaro's verbal attacks on indigenous groups "is an attempt to vilify them and generate hate towards them to advance this idea of the need to generate economic growth".

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke with Brazilian President-Elect Jair Bolsonaro over phone on Monday to discuss bilateral ties and collaboration on Venezuela.

Bolsonaro's rhetoric has proved beneficial to certain sectors. Paulo Guedes, an economist educated at the US University of Chicago, has advocated for tax and spending cuts that he believes will reverse the country's deficit.

On Sunday, Bolsonaro was elected president of Brazil. New rules will boost investment in infrastructure, he told reporters. Globo said on Tuesday that federal government advertising represented less than 4 percent of the revenue for its flagship channel, TV Globo, without providing more detailed figures. "The lack of fiscal space, a high unemployment rate and a sluggish economic recovery will also likely limit economic policy options".

German diplomatic circles are equally blasé and are awaiting Mr. Bolsonaro's first moves as president.

The goal is to reduce by half some 29 ministries by combining others, such as Agriculture and Environment, said Deputy Onyx Lorenzoni, who may become Bolsonaro's next chief of staff.

"Democracy must be able to endure a candidate like Bolsonaro", said Martin Duisberg, vice-president of the German-Brazilian Chamber of Commerce in Sao Paulo.

In parallel, representatives for Bolsonaro will begin meeting with President Michel Temer's team to start work ahead of the January 1 inauguration.

"The PT elected Bolsonaro", he said in an interview published Wednesday. He said the Temer government may approve the deal before leaving.